What better place to start our series of member spotlights but with our very first member! Dr. Gail West, now a retired professor of education, was the first one to sign up as a Geeks on Tour member in July of 2008. But her association started even before Chris and Jim Guld were known as the Geeks on Tour.

After flying small planes when she was younger, Gail became an RVer in 2004. At the time, she was teaching courses online at the University of Central Florida, and she wanted to learn how she could teach her courses while on the road in her RV. She had become a member of FMCA to learn more about RVing and noted in the program for the 2006 Rally in Charlotte that there was going to be some sessions on getting connected while travelling. That’s where she first met this husband/wife team who were getting started giving seminars with FMCA.

Gail was hooked. She read their blog from beginning to end to learn more about them personally and professionally and to follow their travels.

Three years later, she went the FMCA Rally in Perry, GA, specifically to learn more about technology, especially blogs, from the Geeks. She created her blog on the way home to Orlando from Perry. This comes from her blog, “Wandering West”:

The main reason I went to the FMCA rally was to take as many seminars presented by Jim and Chris Guld (better known as Geeks on Tour). I managed to get to five of the six they presented (all were excellent). You can get hand-outs and how-to videos at their website.
One seminar was about creating blogs. So I thought I might as well start now since there is not too much to do at this campground after you see the peacocks and goats. I am also using Picasa 3 for editing the photos used here, which was another seminar presented by the Geeks.
I am naming this blog Wandering West since I love to travel, and the focus of this blog will be my travels.

When the Gulds announced that they were starting a membership program to get even more of their ever-widening technological information, Gail joined immediately and became the first paid member. She also attended their special Techno-Geek RV rally in April of 2012.

As new technologies (cell phones, smart phones, tablets) and new programs and apps to work with them (Google Photos) have come along, Gail relies on the Geeks to keep her up-to-date by watching their weekly program, What Does This Button Do, reviewing the show notes, tracking the Newsletters, watching Chris’ tutorial videos, reviewing the forum, and reading the Geeks’ books.

Gail lives in Orlando, Florida, but you will rarely find her there! In the past fifteen years, Gail has traveled by RV throughout much of the United States. She has also taken several lengthy cruises: a trans-Atlantic cruise with stops all around the Mediterranean, an east coast cruise starting in Montreal, along the St. Lawrence seaway and down to Florida; a Panama canal cruise starting in San Diego and ending in Fort Lauderdale, and another trans-Atlantic cruise starting in Copenhagen and traveling west to Florida. She toured South America, including Machu Picchu, Chile, Uruguay, Argentina and Brazil. She has been to Europe on a holiday river cruise from Nuremburg to Amsterdam stopping at Christmas Markets along the way, as well as to China and Russia. Probably her favorite trip was spending six weeks in Seville, Spain, attending a Spanish language school. Gail is passionate about travel, photos, and technology, but above all she loves to learn.

3 Responses to “Member Spotlight: Gail West”

Gail West is one of the three best teachers I ever had in a long career of getting educated and becoming an educator myself. She knows good teaching when she sees it and has been enthusiastic about Geeks on Tour from the outset until now. Even I, a non-techie, became a member as a result of her unflagging praise for the Gulds and their website.